Assorted Fic Ideas
by Kickaha
Summary: Story fragments I've begun and will later expand into fics, along with the occasional dead story from writing group efforts. If you want insight into my writing, here's the place to look.
1. Chapter 1

Originally written for Bob Schoeck's "Changed" universe after 911, on the Tramsformation Story Archive mailing list.

Ed.

Mechs are a pain in the ass.

Sorry to be so blunt, but it's the truth. Have YOU ever tried painting a ten meter tall, fusion powered, anthropomophic killing machine?

I didn't think so.

And don't EVEN get me started about the dust filters. Afganistan is just one huge dustbowl. Uhg.

I still remember waking up that morning, flipping on the TV, and staring, stunned, at the two smoking holes in the World Trade Center towers. Watching them collapse. I stumbled around the room for a bit,  
>then headed to the kitchen for a drink.<p>

Along the way, I tripped over the helmet.

For a moment, I thought it was my old motorcycle helmet, a relic of days when I was young, stupid, and loved to risk my life trying to balance on a pair of seriously over-powered wheels. But that was still hanging on a peg in the living room, covered in the dust of years of disuse.

Picking the helmet up I realized the weight of it. HEAVY. Then I spotted the bulky suit, neatly folded, that had been lying beneath it.

Had to be a practical joke, I told myself. Neuro-helmets were a part of my role-playing game, NOT the real world.

Of course, an hour later, my sense of reality got a swift kick in the gonads when the dwarves showed up on live TV, digging into the rubble of the collapsed towers.

Being the idiot that I was, I just HAD to step outside and look around.

When you live on the Great Plains of the American West, a ten meter tall man-shaped robotic combat machine tends to stand out just a little bit.

It took a while to walk to New York, even at 100 kilometers per hour, and I'm afraid I attracted a little attention. Fortunately, a few other giant robots had already showed up in Manhatten, and someone with more than just half a brain had ordered the combat air patrols to avoid attacking anything that "looks like it comes from a cartoon."

THAT officer deserves a Silver Star for quick thinking in a crisis situation.

The newsies, however, were actually helpful. Because about halfway into Ohio, someone hacked into my external comm lines and said "Hi!"

Turns out a LOT of people had Changed. And not all of them were suitable for rescue operations. But they made perfect combat types.  
>And they were extending me an invite.<p>

Didn't take long for them to find a place for me to stash the mech. As outraged as the nation was, there were still people so utterly self-centered, they looked upon the Changed as their personal ticket to whatever.. world rule, lots of cash, you name it. And of course the occasional goverment idiot who wanted to confiscate things in the name of "National Security". (ie, What's mine is mine, and what's yours is mine, chummer.. we're the goverment, we're ABOVE the law.)

Didn't take long for things to pull together, either. The internet was very useful for that. The date was set, a time agreed upon.

Some argued that we were taking the law into our own hands. One fellow in a particularly nasty looking powered suit pointed out that while the US military could _invade_ Afganistan, the Al Queda could just go to ground and vanish like the vermin they were. But we had mages, we had psis, and we had people who could ride the 'net like it was their own brain. It would be a hell of a lot harder to hide from us, he insisted.

And so we went.

"War... it's fan-tastic!"

- Miguel Ferrer, "Hot Shots, Part Deux"

The GI Joe fans were first in. They'd been changed into the best of the best, and it showed. The magic-users and the psychics pinpointed the locations, and the Joes ghosted in so quietly, the Delta Force would have broken down into tears of sheer envy.

The street samurai followed, just as quietly. They infiltrated the few cities Afganistan had, looking no different from any other piece of the human flotsam that drifted in and around Southeast Asia.

And the shapeshifters. THAT was a hoot, right there. At the moment of the attack one member of the Taliban was busy petting a friendly cat that had taken up residence outside his headquarters the day before. A heartbeat later, the cat had transformed and a female were-tiger was ripping out his throat with her teeth.

Unfortunately for the Taliban, their AK-47's weren't loaded with silver bullets.

Live and learn. Or die and don't learn, in his case.

Finally, with a roar, came those of us with truly HEAVY firepower.  
>The giant robots. The occasional Autobot. The mechas. And the superhero types.<p>

One guy had a brilliant idea. He'd found himself with a spiffy set of spandex leotards and a pair of tank-fed super-soakers. Not particularly useful on the battlefield, you might think. But he was able to summon up almost ANYTHING that qualified as a liquid. So some wag with a twisted sense of humor suggested pig urine.

We'd all broken up laughing. Then, almost as one, thoughtful looks appeared...

Islamic fundamentalists were fanatical fighters. They had the advantage of knowing for 'certain' that, should they die in battle with the infidel, they'd immediately ascend to Paradise, Warriors for Allah Himself, to be praised and rewarded by him.

But only if they remained pure. If they happened to die while ritually unclean, they were screwed. The Q'uran _said_ so.

And wouldn't you know, drenching a follower of Islam in pig urine and pig blood qualified as making them unclean. If they died before they could cleanse themselves, they'd never get to Paradise.

Once we spread the word of what happened to be in those pressurized tanks, you wouldn't BELIEVE how fast some of them ran when they saw Mr. Super Soaker take to the field.

Others, of course, merely fought all the harder. Until they were soaked, that is. Then they BEGGED to be spared for just long enough to clean themselves according to the laws of the Q'uran.

Some people accused us of mental cruelty. That what we were doing qualified as "cruel and unusual punishment", forbidden by the Eighth Amendment to the American Constituion.

Last time I checked, the Al Queda weren't American citizens.

It wasn't all beer and skittles. War never is. People who've never seen it never seem to understand that.

They think it's like the movies.

They're fools.

Two companies of Taliban infantry that had gone to ground were trying to make it to the Pakistani border, in hopes of vanishing into the general population, thinking that they'd fight again another day.

They thought they had a chance because they'd grabbed some Western reporters, holding them hostage for our 'good behavior'. Threatening to mutilate the hostages if we were so much as even spotted, and to kill them if we tried to attack.

I was the only one in position. Just me, and my mech. I felt cold inside. If any of the mages or psychics had been nearby, we might have been able to pull off a rescue with no casualties. As it was, if I tried to stop them, people would die.

I didn't have a choice.

I positioned myself, made certain all weapons were up and ready.  
>Then, I remembered something, from another war and another time.<p>

I couldn't give myself away, that would make what I was about to do worse than useless. But perhaps I could send a message to the hostages and hope they'd understand and forgive me.

I brought up the tactical display, highlighted a point on the map where they'd be within range of my weapons, and tied the blip into the external speakers. Then I waited.

I could see them approaching on the ranged sensors, a rag-tag collection of battered trucks and autos stolen from everywhere, with the hostages tied and gagged in a pickup in the middle of the pathetic little convoy.

As the last vehicle passed the deadline I'd marked, the speakers began to wail, and I opened fire.

And I prayed for the sake of my soul that the hostages would understand.

All our times have come Here but now they're gone Seasons don't fear the reaper Nor do the wind, the sun or the rain we can be like they are Come on baby don't fear the reaper...

Eight hostages.

Three survived.

Four were intact enough to be raised once a priest of some sort reached them. A priestess of Hestia who'd been a nurse in her previous life was on the ground and going through the needed ceremonies.

One wasn't coming back. Turns out the Taliban could be just as hypocritical as any Westerner. One of them suffered from loose lips and had bragged to the hostages that he'd had been watching televison on the sly from a satellite dish. (He'd excused it to his superiors as "gathering information on the enemy.") He'd seen the resurrections in New York, and decided on his own to do something about it. His vest had been packed with a mixture of white phosphorus, magnesium,  
>C-4, and roofing nails.<p>

When I attacked the convoy, he'd grabbed one of the hostages,  
>screamed "Allah is great!", and pulled the cord.<p>

The fireball hadn't left enough of either of them to bury, let alone resurrect.

Their leader had survived. One of a very few, as a laser with a beam diameter of 40 cm tended to vaporize most of whatever it hit. He'd been ejected from his stolen Japanese 4WD when it had struck another vehicle and flipped over. His arm was shattered, and blood dripped through the rag tied around it as a sling. The priestess wanted to heal him too, but I stopped her.

I didn't... no, I _couldn't_ recognize my own voice when I ordered her to tend to the hostages.

I took a captured AK-47 and several unfired magazines, placing them in the hand of my mech before climbing back aboard and turning in the leader's direction. Putting myself between him and the hostages I dropped the AK at his feet.

"Run. Now. Or I'll simply step on you."

He shook his head gingerly, wincing from the pain.

"Run. Or die. You have five minutes headstart."

Then I hunted him down like a rabid dog. He could actually see the Pakistani border and thought he'd escaped. That's when I appeared behind him.

When I was done, the Pakistani border guards were bent over their rifles, vomiting. And I made damn certain that, like the hostage he'd taken, there wasn't enough left of him for any priest to resurrect.

Then I pissed on the ashes.

The backup team that had arrived with the priestess didn't say a word when I returned.

After that I found I'd began a legend. One of the mages told me that a story was spreading by word of mouth among the Afghans, a story of a bloody machine that sang of fire and darkness as it avenged the innocent dead.

The mage was a decent person at heart. I couldn't blame him for looking at me with some disgust when I smiled grimly. He didn't understand.

Fear is a weapon.

Frank Castle understood that. As did Bruce Wayne and Lamont Cranston. John Reid knew it by heart.

So I used it as the weapon it was. The terrorists sought to rule with terror. They chose to live superstitious cowardly lives. I merely turned their terror back upon them.

I asked one of the Changed with a load of chrome in his head to link my mech to the net. I downloaded the appropriate songs, then I went hunting.

You're seeing now a veteran of a thousand psychic wars:  
>I've been living on the edge so long,<br>where the winds of Limbo roar.  
>And I'm young enough to look at,<br>And far too old to see-all the scars are on the inside.  
>I'm not sure that there's anything left of me.<p>

"Injustice is relatively easy to bear; what stings is justice."

- H. L. Mencken.

It worked. I'm not proud of what I did. I'll never be proud of it. But looking at young Afghani children playing football in the streets, seeing women going to school unafraid, watching men walking to work without an AK-47 over one shoulder and a grim, haunted look on their faces...

That made it worthwhile.

Some prices are worth paying.

And it wasn't all grim, either. Sometimes it was beautiful, and other times funny to the point of tears of laughter.

One case happened when a priest, a mage and a shaman all got together, trying to relax over a few beers. One thing lead to another, and nearly seventy-two hours later they stumbled out of the bar with a killer hang-over and an idea that changed everything.

The author H. Beam Piper, in describing a character in one of his novels, said of him that "the law is my religion, and my catechism is to apply it with fairness and impartiality." Turns out the mage was a fan of Piper's works, and in his rather buzzed state, related portions of the novel to the priest and the shaman.

The conclusion the three mildly drunken friends came to was: "Why not?"

The spell they cast combined everything they knew from three differing fields of magic, and they tied it to the very soul of the land itself.

And when they were done, they'd managed to manifest Justice.

Not a statue. Not a concept. Justice herself.

And ANY Afghan who accepted the position of a judge would have to answer to her, personally.

That's when the three got VERY sober.

In the short run it was pretty damned scary. In the long run?  
>Even scarier. But perhaps the best thing that could ever have happened.<p>

I'd never met a goddess, and I really didn't want to. But there she was, and the law was her religion, the courts her temples, and every judge in Afghanistan her priests. I still recall the first time someone actually tried to lie under oath after she came into existance.

Ouch. Nasty. (I never did learn if they found all the pieces of that poor, sorry bastard. Seems the sword Justice carried wasn't _entirely_ symbolic.)

But it worked. And did more than anything else to turn what had been a collection of fragmented tribes into a nation. They no longer had to worry if a judge was going to make his rulings on the basis of tribal loyalty rather than true justice.

Of course, not everyone was HAPPY about getting true, impartial and even-handed justice. Most of us don't REALLY want justice, we want what we THINK is justice.. namely, whatever gives us a leg up and throws a stumbling block into the paths of our rivals/enemies. We just don't want to admit that to ourselves.

And those who wanted to see the Sharia reimposed were furious at the thought that an entirely secular form of justice could do what they'd done, and do it better, with more honesty. Though that's what _really_ stung them.. the honesty bit.

Served them right.

Someone with a nasty sense of humor carved a quote from Abe Lincoln over the first courthouse rebuilt in Kabul, translated into all the languages of Afghanistan.

"Let reverence for the laws be breathed by every American mother to the lisping babe that prattles on her lap. Let it be taught in schools, in seminaries, and in colleges. Let it be written in primers, spelling books, and in almanacs. Let it be preached from the pulpit, proclaimed in legislative halls, and enforced in the courts of justice. And, in short, let it become the political religion of the nation."

It was... amusing... to watch the more fanatically religious types read that, then stalk off, their faces livid, their necks rigid with rage.

Every summer when it rains, I smell the jungle, I hear the planes. I can't tell no one I feel ashamed. Afraid someday I'll go insane.

"Dreamers may die, but the Dream is eternal..."


	2. Chapter 2

~*~

Diagon Alley was in chaos.

"Avada Kedavra!" and a child died.

Much to one Death Eater's annoyance, a man simply sat at his table in Florean's refusing to flee. Excellent. Another death for Lord Voldemort.

Behind his mask, Lucius was mildly irked. Was the fool blind, or merely brainless? He wasn't even trying to draw a wand. The soon to be dead man gave Malfoy a contemptuous look that drove his ire to pure anger.

"Ava-"

"Access: J'edd J'arkus."

Lucius swore as his target vanished. An invisibility cloak? No. A cloak could render you invisible, but donning one was obvious. A spell? He didn't recognize the phrase the man had spoken. Possibly a spell in a foreign tongue. Well, invisibility, disillusioning and other cloaking spells might hide a person, but they couldn't hide what that person did. A quick bit of wandwork, and the dust outside of Florean's turned a bright white. A smirk twisted Malfoy's lips. Whatever the idiot had done, his footprints would give him away.

That was the last thought Lucius had before two arms emerged from the ground beneath him and crushed his kneecaps.

Voldemort was incensed. A simple terror raid on Diagonal Alley, and all - ALL! - of his Death Eaters had apparated back in abject defeat,  
>babbling about a mysterious wizard who, unseen, had shattered their elbows and left them unable to wield their wands properly.<p>

To add insult to injury, this unknown wizard walked away from the battle, leaving his followers crippled but alive.

Why?

Whoever this wizard was, he was capable. Five of Voldemort's best,  
>led by Lucius, had been defeated with embarrassing ease.<p>

His spies inside the Ministry would find the identity of this mystery man, or they would suffer. And once he was known to Voldemort, the stranger would die.

Riddle gave the appropriate orders to a waiting Death Eater, then turned his attention to other, far more important matters. There were preparations to be made to create his seventh and final Horcrux.  
>Once that had been finished, the one, true immortal Dark Lord would take his place over all of England.<p>

The world would follow in due course.

After all, he would then have all the time in the world.

Patience can be such a simple thing, when one is immortal.

To the wizard known as "Lord Voldemort"

I take pen in hand to inform you that your plans for world domination do not concern me. Your actions towards 'wizards' and 'witches' are likewise of little interest to me.

Your lackeys attacked me, I retaliated. That is an action I believe you are familiar with.

Do with your world as you will. It is of little concern to me.  
>When your followers attack me, I will return fire. Should they refrain, I shall do the same.<p>

As you do not know of me, you have no reason to trust me.  
>With that in mind, I offer you this - it would be in your own self interest to do something about those appallingly primitive soul anchors of yours. Felix often made use of similar constructs, and in the process developed a number of simple and easy methods to locate them and disrupt them, even when they are behind wards and shielding.<p>

The ring, the cup, the tiara? You might as well have left signposts for your enemies to follow. Jim Craddock would have been dismayed to learn that his spiritual heir (so to speak) had been brought so low.

While I fully understand the use of symbolism, really,  
>leaving your containers alone and unguarded as you have is risky. And your use of a theme - relics of importance to the Founders - made them even easier to discover.<br>A theme is a weakness. And a weakness is dangerous.

In closing, I proffer the unsolicited advice that you take better steps to conceal your weaknesses, and suggest that should your followers again encounter me, they simply turn aside. I see no need to kill them unless they provoke me.

F. Halloran

Minister Bagnold glared at Amelia Bones. "The entire assets of the DMLE at your disposal, and a single wizard cannot be found? Despite having paid to have an editorial letter printed in the Prophet? What are your people being paid for, then? Lounging about and having high tea? Perhaps I should have that madman Moody brought in.  
>He certainly couldn't do any worse."<p>

The Head Auror took a tighter grip on her monocle and returned the glare. "I've three teams working on it, and they've found nothing.  
>No magical trace, no signatures, NOTHING, Madam Bagnold.<br>And before you shout at me, I've even requested the aid of the Unspeakables. They've had a team searching for the mystery wizard since the day of the attack and they're even more obsessed with discovering who he is than YOU are." Amelia rubbed at her aching eyesocket, then went on. "Whoever - or WHATEVER - he is, he performed spells without leaving any residue behind, and the Unspeakables dearly want to know how that was done - if only because they want to do so themselves."

Bagnold let out an angry sigh. "And the information given in the letter? The names? Who is this 'Jim Craddock' mentioned in the letter? And is there _any_ truth to the accusation of ..."

Her voice sank to a uneasy whisper. "... of the use of a horcrux?"

Amelia's expression gave her all the answer she needed to know.

"So it's true. You Know Who has achieved immortality."

"No!" Bones' reply was curt. "The... containers will only hold his soul here on Earth. Destroy his body, and the Dark Lord will be nothing more than a ghost. Less than that. Destroy the items used,  
>and even that protection will fail him. And that annoying letter, however much it's stirred up the general public, did us one favor.<br>If there's any truth to it, then we know what he probably used as containers. Knowing what to look for, however blindly, is better than not knowing at all."

Now it was Amelia's turn to sigh. "Not that much better, but still better than the groping in the dark we were doing. If You-Know-Who _did_ use relics of the Founders, then there are limits as to where he could hide them. It's not as if the bloody things can be hidden just anywhere. Would YOU trust your soul to something that everyone in the world covets? This Halloran fellow mentioned the Founder's relics specifically, and a cup. Even a squib would know that means the Hufflepuff Cup. That's like putting your soul in the bloody statue in the Ministry! Everyone and their cousin could walk by and tamper with it."

Millicent nodded reluctantly. "And the Cup would stand out like a ruddy forest fire. Only so many places you could hide something that powerful." She paused to take a sip of tea, hoping it would soothe her frayed nerves. "And the names mentioned in the letter?"

Amelia's angry frown lightened a bit. "Some useful news there, though I don't know if it was intentional on the writer's part. Given the context of the letter, 'Jim Craddock' was probably James Craddock, a muggleborn from the last century who took up a career as a highwayman in the early 1800's." She paused to take a shrunken folder from her purse.

"This next bit I had to _force_ out of the Unspeakables, and they're more than a little furious that I did. They flatly informed me that if I shared this information with you and it leaked, the Ministry would need a new Head of the DMLE, a new Head Auror... and a new Minister."

"What?" The outrage in Bagnold's voice was palpable.

Bones sighed. "I read it. I can barely believe it. And if it's true,  
>the Unspeakables would have nearly every right to kill the lot of us to keep it secret, Minister. Now, do you still want to know?"<p>

"Tell me," said Bagnold in a tight voice.

"'Gentleman' James Craddock made a pact with a demon to become immortal in return for stealing ten souls that the demon needed to enter the mortal world. He failed, obviously."

"Obviously," echoed Bagnold weakly.

"But for his failure, the demon cursed him to walk the Earth as a ghost, albeit one with more power than most. Craddock had expected to live as an immortal wizard. Now he's just a better dressed version of Peeves the poltergeist."

"Merlin's brazen balls," whispered Millicent. "If the public knew that was possible... buying immortality by stealing other people's souls instead of tearing up your own..."

"The wizarding world would turn into an unending war," nodded Bones. "To buy their own immortality without any cost to themselves."

Minster looking for the mystery wizard - Voldemort's spies disguise their interest later (try to recall shower idea) 


	3. Chapter 3

There was no other way to describe it.

Xander was in love.

Blindly, totally in love.

Hell, it might even surpass his love of Twinkies.

But alas, it was a love he knew would be unrequited. There was no way in... well, in that other place that people in Sunnydale tried not to think about much... that he could possibly afford it.

That's when he felt the tap on his shoulder, and practically hit the ceiling in reaction.

"Beautiful, isn't it, lad?" asked the owner of the costume shop.

"Oh, god, yes! It looks like it just walked off the set. Is it... real?"

Ethan Rayne grinned. Chaos mage though he be, he could still appreciate a fellow fan. "Sadly, no. That item was auctioned off for charity some years ago. But this is a licensed reproduction, authorized by Universal Studios."

Xander reached out with a careful finger, gently brushing it over the gold oak leaf sprigs decorating the shoulder patches of the leather jacket. "What I wouldn't give..."

"Then why not rent it for the night?" smiled Rayne.

"There's no way I could possibly afford it, Mr...?"

"Ethan Rayne, lad. The owner of this humble shop. And you say you can't afford it. Well then, how much do you have?"

"I'm the Two Dollar Costume King, Mr. Rayne. 'Cause that's all I have at the moment. I'm going to use an old set of jungle fatigues, and was just going to buy a prop gun to go with them. Then I saw this."

Xander would have died before admitting it, but he'd gone google-eyed at the sight of the famous jacket.

"I'll make you a deal, lad." Ethan grinned like a madman. "Do you believe in advertising?"

"Huh? Err.. you mean like commercials?"

"Yes, indeed. Here's the deal. You may rent this jacket from me until Halloween is over. You'll walk out of my shop wearing this jacket, and return it the next day. You'll wear it the entire time, and you'll tell everyone you meet where you rented it. You'll pass out my business cards to them - I will give you a box full. In return, the rent on this jacket will be... two dollars."

Were it possible, Xander's eyes would have gotten even wider. "Seriously?" To his embarrassment, his voice squeaked.

"Seriously."

Xander dropped to his knees and began to bow. "I will make your name famous in the history of Halloween for centuries to come!"

Rayne began to laugh uproariously. "No need for that, lad. But I appreciate the sentiment. Here, let's get it off the display mannequin and get you some of my calling cards. The sooner you pass them around, the sooner I'll become famous, eh?"


	4. Chapter 4

A Paladin/Blazing Saddles crossover.

San Francisco was an elegant town, even for the 1870's.

Fueled by gold, driven by the hunger of the nouveau rich to appear sophisticated and urbane, the best the world had to offer was imported to the city by the bay, and damn the cost.

One such bastion of quality and good taste was the prestigious Hotel Carlton. And among its more interesting residents was a former officer and gentleman.

This darkly elegant man loved life, and all the pleasures it could bring. He dressed in the most expensive clothes of the day, and always had an appropriate quote at the ready, Shelley or Montaigne for a beguiling lady, or Socrates and Shakespeare for those of his own gender. He was able to speak several languages, play piano and compose his own symphonies, and even amaze and amuse his compatriots by ascertaining a bourbon's distillery with a single sip. He liked the arts, fine food, brandy, cigars, gambling, acquiring knowledge, and he absolutely loved women.

Only a few of his friends were aware of his compulsive reading of newspapers from across the entire continent, and those who were merely took it as a harmless eccentricity.

They could not have been more wrong.

Today, the dark man was reading a simple, four page newspaper that hardly deserved the title, from a tiny,  
>almost non-existent town in one of the Western territories. Frowning, he set the small broadsheet aside for a larger publication, one that came from the capital of the territory where the tiny town was located.<p>

Reading for several minutes, his frown deepened. Then he left the lobby of the Carlton, headed for his room.

In his room, in a locked closet, lay a heavy oaken chest.  
>The elegant man opened the chest, removing the contents. They were nothing remarkable, except, perhaps, in that such an elegant gentleman would own such crude items.<p>

Simple, rough-looking clothing. A black cotton shirt. A pair of black denim jeans. Heavy cowboy boots, scarred and worn. A black hat.

And lying atop them, a gunbelt.

The Colt .45 in that holster had been hand crafted to his exacting specifications. Its balance was excellent, and the trigger responded to a pressure of one ounce. He rarely drew it unless he meant to use it.

The silver chess knight set into the leather holster and the wooden grip glittered in the sunlight from a nearby window as it was quietly packed into a pair of saddlebags,  
>along with the dark clothing it had been resting with.<p>

He'd have to hurry. There wasn't much time. And it was a long ride to Rock Ridge.


	5. Chapter 5

Couldn't stand the "new" movie butchered by Tim Burton, having grown up with Gene Wilder's version. So, this fic was born.

**Pure Imagination.**

Xander fingered the velvety cloth, sighing sadly.

He could never afford this. He placed the jacket back on the rack, setting the accompanying tophat on the shelf above. He jumped when an English-accented voice addressed him from behind.

"You sound somewhat depressed, lad. Is there something the matter?"

Harris shrugged. "It's a wonderful costume. But I can't afford it. Just call me the two-dollar costume king. And it's a damned shame - Giles would have laughed his ass off seeing me in it."

Ethan Rayne raised an eyebrow. "Giles? I had a friend named Giles once.. this wouldn't be RUPERT Giles, perchance?"

Xander nodded. "He's our librarian at the high school."

Rayne's smile never altered. "Well, then. I simply CANNOT allow you to leave my establishment without this costume. It just wouldn't do to allow a student of my old friend to depart without the right costume for this holiday."

"But I don't have the cash."

"Quite all right, that. All I ask is that, when someone asks you where you acquired such a fine costume, you direct them to my shop."

"You're okay with that? Really?"

"Oh, my, yes. Please. It would be my pleasure. You might be interested to know that the coat and hat are the originals from the movie."

Xander lifted the plum-colored frock coat and the warm brown tophat reverently. "You're not joking, are you?"

"I do not joke about my offerings, Mr...?"

"Harris. Xander Harris. They really are them?"

Rayne nodded, his smile glowing. "That they are, Mr. Harris. In fact, I will include the walking stick as well. Wear them well, and do honor to the character."

Xander stroked the coat possessively. "Oh, yeah. Be sure of that, Mr. Rayne. Be sure of that."

Xander faced a serious challenge. One he NEVER thought a manly man like himself would face.

He had straight hair.

Bugger.

"Okay," he muttered, "I _really_ need to stop listening to G-man's slang... it's rotting my fine American mind."

But what to do? Then it hit him.

His parents were worse than useless, but what about Buffy's Mom? She'd know what to do!

"What can I do, Ms. Summers?"

Joyce grinned wickedly as she grabbed her car keys. "You're coming with me, Xander. I have the perfect solution."

Xander was now officially worried. That was the same "I am Buffy, I am Slayer, hear me roar!" smile that the Buffster got only when she had a plan guarenteed to scare him silly.

He'd often wondered where she'd got it from.

Too bad he had to find out the hard way.

Twenty minutes later, he was sitting in a chair while a gentleman of rather indeterminate sexuality named 'Reynaldo' clucked and tutted over his scalp.

"What DO you use on your hair, young one? You have the WORST case of split ends Reynaldo ever seen in this shop!"

Xander glared at Joyce, who was busy trying not to laugh at the dark expression on Xander's face.

"I use soap, okay? Soap soap. Look, I just need this just for Halloween night. I'm not here for a makeover, and I _don't_ have any long term plans that involve moving to Castro Street!"

Reynaldo sighed. "But you have such beau-" He caught the murderous look in Xander's eyes, and cut the statement short.

"Reynaldo will do what Reynaldo can. But even the marvelous Reynaldo is limited as to what he can do with the materials on hand." The hairdresser looked at the costume Xander had brought, as well as the videotape case Joyce had grabbed on the way out of her house. "Reynaldo can do this, but it WILL require the use of a wig. Do you have any complaints with this, Alexander?"

"That's Xander. JUST Xander. I do not like Alexander.I do not ANSWER to Alexander. And a wig will be okay, since it's only for one night. I just don't know if I can afford it."

Joyce smiled at him. "Not to worry, Xander. Reynaldo is my regular stylist. I'll have him put it on my bill, and you can pay me off in mowed lawns."

"I can't let you do-"

"_Xander_"

The dreaded Mom Look was aimed at him, and like Buffy, he folded under its relentless power.


End file.
